Former support worker gives evidence during inquest into death of boy sleeping in skip bin

Former support worker gives evidence during inquest into death of boy sleeping rough in Port Lincoln skip bin In short: An inquest is examining the circumstances around the death of a 13-year-old boy, who was sleeping rough in an industrial skip bin at Port Lincoln in 2021. A woman who worked at an Aboriginal support service tells the inquest that police and government staff did not understand her organisation's approach of managing children. What's next? The inquest is expected to hear from agencies including the Department for Child Protection. The former manager of an Aboriginal support service has told an inquest into the death of a 13-year-old boy, that she felt police and child protection authorities were "beating her up" over not doing a good job of managing children in the regional South Australian city. WARNING: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander readers are advised that this article contains the name and image of an Indigenous person who has died, used with the permission of their family. Budda Spencer, as his family would like him to be known for cultural reasons, died in May 2021, after the industrial skip bin he was sleeping in was tipped into a rubbish truck during a routine collection. Two young boys, aged 11 and 12 who were under the Department for Child Protection's (DCP) care, were also sleeping in the bin, but they were unharmed. Budda Spencer was not under the department's care. The former manager of Port Lincoln's Aboriginal Family Support Services (AFSS) Angela Backman told the inquest on Tuesday she felt both SA Police and the child protection department did not understand her service's therapeutic approach to encourage children to return to their families. "I went to a meeting and I just felt like DCP and SAPOL were saying that we weren't doing our job because the children were constantly going missing," Ms Backman told the court. Ms Backman said AFSS's role was to support parents and help keep Port Lincoln families together. "At one point we were driving around behind these young people, following them everywhere in town — to the point that it was putting them at risk where they were jumping out in front of cars … we had to pull back," she told the inquest. "That is not how we work, our role working with children is to build relationships and work in a therapeutic manner. "At one point SAPOL said we should put barbed wire around a residential service, so I thought that was quite … not productive." Counsel for SAPOL Ben Garnaut questioned Ms Backman whether that sentiment was on one or multiple occasions. "One occasion," Ms Backman replied. "I think [the police] were frustrated." Support from the department Ms Backman told the inquest her former service would provide "voluntary" parenting programs, and offered Budda Spencer's mother Deborah Betts support, but she did not attend due to illness. She told the court AFSS provided regular support to Budda Spencer's two friends related to the inquest, and became familiar with the 13-year-old through them. Ms Backman explained DCP would enlist her service to read out to families needing support, and she would provide programs to support those families who chose to join — and if families did not engage, she would refer the "risk" back to DCP. Counsel assisting Rebecca Schell asked Ms Backman if she felt there should be more overarching support from the DCP, including departmental staff physically attending meetings with AFSS staff. Ms Backman agreed, adding DCP were "the ones that have the powers to enforce participation, we don't have any of that". The former manager also told the inquest DCP generally were not visiting at-risk children. "They're supposed to have a relationship with the children, they never visited the children — so they didn't quite understand what we had to deal with on a day-to-day basis," she said. Concerns raised before his death During her opening statements, counsel assisting Rebecca Schell told the court Budda Spencer's mother became "increasingly worried about her son", which she had reported to multiple agencies. Ms Schell said a notification was raised with the DCP in March 2021 that Budda Spencer was an "adolescent at risk". "On one occasion, [Budda] Spencer had attempted to hitchhike to Ceduna — that was at the end of March 2021," Ms Schell said. "On another occasion, his family had reported him missing on Facebook and to the police." Ms Schell said a week before Budda's death, Ms Betts attended Port Lincoln Health Services to seek assistance for her son. "[Budda] Spencer had lost weight and by this stage his attitude was said to be poor,"Ms Schell said. "He would run away from family when they saw him. "Deborah Betts thought she was losing control of her son." Ms Schell said there were a series of notifications raised between the end of March 2021 and to [Budda] Spencer's death two months later. "These notifications to the Department for Child Protection will be explored as a part of this inquest," she said. "Concerns were raised about his general wellbeing at a meeting on 4 May 2021, which was only six days prior to his death," Ms Schell said. The court heard the meeting was attended by various agencies which included West Coast Youth support services, Youth Justice, AFSS, SA Police and the Department for Human Services.